Category Archives: phone

Android, internet, OnePlus, phone, Tech

OnePlus One: No LTE or Network

Aside Leave a comment

I recently upgraded my OnePlus One to Android 6.0.1 and while I can make phone calls I don’t have any network connectivity unless I’m on WiFi. The symptoms are;

  • Can’t send email,
  • No access any websites
  • Phone is not on a LTE network

This awkward fix, posted byrohitvermamech on the OnePlus Forums  get’s LTE and networking working again:

Step 1:
Go into Settings > Mobile Networks > Access Point Names > Restore Defaults
The list should now have many many more choices of APNs. Choose the correct APN. Then go into Settings > Mobile Networks > Network Operators (make sure you are connected to WiFi) click “Choose Automatically”. Then turn Aeroplane Mode on and back off.
Step 2:
VERY IMPORTANT! Restart your phone.
Step 3:
Go into phone and dial *#*#4636#*#* and choose Phone Information. In Phone Information set the Preferred Network Type to LTE/GSM auto (PRL) [even if it says it already, do it again]. Turn off the radio. When the radio is turned off, turn the radio back on. Go down to the SMSC and hit “Refresh” and then “Update”.

 

phone, Tech

My Phone Collection.

Leave a comment
My Phones over the years.
My Phones over the years.
Starting on the left is my very last feature phone a Sony Ericsson C902. Of all of these phones it makes the best phone-calls. Keeping this thing as it was such a great phone.
Still available for $120 at Amazon!
 
Next, Liz’s first Android phone — a Virgin Mobile LG Optimus V.  Keeping this as we can quickly reuse it for any visitors from Ireland and it’s a simple phone to use.
 
Next is my second Android phone a Samsung S2, I got this phone as the screen on my first Android a HTC Sensation cracked. I still have the HTC as I had plans to replace the screen but it’s hardly worth it at this point. The S2 was quite a step-up, lovely screen but it was missing a little something (this phone is being gifted to a friend for reuse), I hope he finds it better than today’s cheap Android phones.
Next up is my 3rd Android a Google Nexus 4, this was the first Android phone that really, really impressed me and is still a great device — fantastic camera too. I use this as my Irish Phone and it has my Irish SIM card in it and I’ll be walking around Ireland later this week with two phones as my US T-Mobile plan gives me free texts and data while in Ireland, and I can make free phone calls to any Irish phone after topping this up with 20 Euros.
 
The big yoke is my current phone a OnePlus One, fabulous device almost too big but at least I can read the text on the screen! 😉
Next a sweet Amazon Fire Phone that is someone’s Christmas present. Hopefully the Amazon App Store won’t be a dealbreaker …
phone, Tech

The Nokia 6230!

2 Comments
Nokia 6230i
Nokia 6230i

Do you remember when a phone like the Nokia 6230 was the phone to have? I remember trying to get one of these for use in the US after seeing a friend’s phone in Ireland. At the time you could only get this model on the Cingular network and the things cost hundred. This phone was a classic for it’s time and it was durable and just worked and it’s form-factor is a classic from the period.

GSMarena has specs on the phone, and Wikipedia has a badly written page about. Those things sold for hundreds of pounds/euros/dollars when they were new in 2005, now you can get one on Ebay for less than 20 quid.

And these days you can an Android phone on Amazon for as low as $30 that’s more powerful that a 2005 era laptop. And you know, I still want this phone, the only problem is I can’t read the screen as it’s too small!

Apple, Laptop, phone

Bluetooth Stops working After upgrade to Mac OS 10.6.3

Leave a comment

Friday before I left work I kicked off the upgrade to Mac OS 10.6.3 on the MacBook Pro (MBP)  I use at work. I’d already upgrade my personal MacBook at home (that I got a deal on at MicroCenter) and I didn’t have any observeable problems or issues and I was confident that I could upgrade and not bork my work environment.

When I arrived back into work on Monday it looked like the upgrade had completed. I logged into the MBP and  my Bluetooth MagicMouse wasn’t working, and all  bluetooth settings were unavailable and grayed out (both on the status bar, and in System Preferences).

I figured something had gotten out of sync during the upgrade and I thought a reboot would fix the problem. Rebooting didn’t fix the problem, but manually reinstalling the upgrade did solve the problem and Bluetooth is active and settings are accessible.

You can manually get the upgrade at:

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1017

However, when I tried to sync with my phone, a Sony Ericsson C902, the connection keeps dropping. So Bluetooth in 10.6.3 might be a bit flaky.

Hardware, Laptop, Linux, phone, Tech, Ubuntu

Ubuntu Linux, T-Mobile, & Nokia N73 as a Bluetooth Modem.

1 Comment

If bluetooth works on your computer, then getting your system to talk to your N73 isn’t hard and I’m not going to cover it here. See this posting for what packages I needed to install to get bluetooth working in my Dell 700M laptop running Ubuntu Linux:

http://timony.com/mickzblog/2007/10/09/ubuntu-bluetooth-sd-card/

If you have T-Mobile T-Zones Internet service for your phone in the US you should be able to use the following procedure to surf the web on your computer using your N73.

First find your Phone’s bluetooth device address (or ID), by typing

*#2820#

into your phone.

You should see a sequence of numbers and letters that look something like this on the screen:

000ABC22BC33

Write it down in this format, (with a colon after every 2nd character):

00:0A:BC:22:BC:33

Next make a backup copy of this file

/etc/bluetooth/rfcomm.conf

For example:

sudo cp  /etc/bluetooth/rfcomm.conf /etc/bluetooth/rfcomm.conf.org

I’m going to presume you’ve never edited this file before, and you can change it to look like this (using the bluetooth device number you discovered):

#
# RFCOMM configuration file.
#
rfcomm0 {
 #      # Automatically bind the device at startup
 	bind yes;
 #
 #      # Bluetooth address of the device
 	device 00:0A:BC:22:BC:33;
 #
 #      # RFCOMM channel for the connection
	channel 2;
 #
 #      # Description of the connection
	comment "Nokia N73";
 }

If you have edited this file before and are already using rfcomm0, then create a new entry named rcomm1 and replace rcomm1 with any other references I make to rcomm0. Also, make sure you get all the semi-colons after each entry in the file.

Next copy the gprs-connect-chat and the gprs-disconnect-chat files from:

http://davesource.com/Solutions/20070520.T-Mobile-Nokia-E65-Ubuntu-Linux.html#networking

In the gprs-connect-chat replace line 47:

OK              'AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","internet2.voicestream.com","",0,0'

With this:

OK              'AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","wap.voicestream.com","",0,0'

Move the 2 files to /etc/ppp/peers:

sudo mv  gprs-connect-chat /etc/ppp/peers
sudo mv  gprs-disconnect-chat  /etc/ppp/peers

Next create a new file in /etc/peers named gprs and copy’n’paste the following (the gprs script that davesource.com uses didn’t work for me):

# GPRS for T-Mobile USA
/dev/rfcomm0 # device bound to T610 phone
230400 # speed
defaultroute # use the network for the default route
usepeerdns # use the DNS servers from the remote network
nodetach # keep pppd in the foreground
crtscts # hardware flow control
lock # lock the serial port
noauth # don’t expect modem to authenticate itself
local # don’t use Carrier Detect or Data Terminal Ready
debug
connect /etc/ppp/peers/gprs-connect-chat
disconnect /etc/ppp/peers/gprs-disconnect-chat

Now your ready to test the connection. First stop networking:

sudo /etc/init.d/networking stop

Next, turn on bluetooth on your phone and connect to it. Once your connect issue the following commands:

rfcomm bind all
 pppd call gprs

When your done, control-c will stop the ppp connection, then run this command:

 rfcomm release all

If you’ve more than one entry defined in your rfcomm.conf file, try using:

frcomm bind rfcomm0

And replace rfcomm0 with rfcomm1 or rfcomm2 …

To web-surf you will need to set your browser to use the following proxy:

216.155.165.50:8080

But, ssh & VPN won’t work, just web-browsing at dial-up speed! However, it might be possible to tunnel ssh and other services.

The following links were a lot of help in aiding me in getting this to work:

http://www.yepthatsme.com/2004/11/09/ppp-chat-scripts-for-t-mobile-sony-ericsson-t610-gprs-via-bluetooth-with-debian/

http://digitalife.wordpress.com/2007/07/31/using-your-mobile-phone-as-a-gprs-modem-with-ubuntu-linux-via-dku-2-usb-cable/

I used the scripts from here to get the laptop to connect (with minor changes):

http://davesource.com/Solutions/20070520.T-Mobile-Nokia-E65-Ubuntu-Linux.html#bluetooth

I need to clean-up/rewrite this posting, and put in proper references to sites that helped me get this working.

Copies of the configuration files are here:

rfcomm.conf

gprs, gprs-connect-chat, gprs-disconnect-chat

phone, Tech

US Wireless Carriers: Bandwidth & Spectrum

Leave a comment

Good blog posting about who has and who hasn’t bandwidth & spectrum amongst the US Mobile phone networks:

http://blogs.gnome.org/dcbw/2007/11/05/t-mo-got-no-spec-trum/

The US has 6 bands that are or will be used for cellular communications:

  • 700MHz – the new band, to be auctioned in February next year. There “open access” rules tied to about 1/3rd of the spectrum to stop carrier locks on devices.
  • 800MHz SMR – where Nextel operates; Nextel bought up taxi dispatch operators nationwide and converted them over to iDEN back when only 2 cellular licenses were available in each market.
  • 850MHz – the original cellular band, initially AMPS but now being converted over to GSM and CDMA
  • 1900MHz – the PCS band, digital from the start and where Sprint and Voicestream (now T-Mobile) entered the cellular industry. All the major players have spectrum here.
  • 1700MHz – the AWS bands auctioned last year for broadband data like HSPA and EVDO
  • 2500MHz – the “educational” band in which both Sprint and Clearwire have vast holdings and will deploy nationwide WiMAX networks over the next two years

And it looks like my mobile phone carrier has the least bandwidt, for now, as they’re a later entry in the US market

Linux, phone, Tech

Ubuntu & Bluetooth, & SD Card.

Leave a comment

Just got a Bluetooth dongle (adaptor) from NewEgg (for $12.99). To get it to be able to browse (using Gnome) my phone I had to install the gnome-vfs-obexftp package (along with the bluez-gnome package).

I also got a Kingston 2 GB MiniSD-Card for my phone (for $20.99), with an adaptor so I can plug the card into my laptop. It looks the card reader on my Dell 700m now works! Previously it didn’t and there was no way to get it to work as there wasn’t a driver for the chipset Dell used.